1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to electronic communications systems. More specifically this invention relates to fault tolerant transportation, fragmentation, and reassembly of segments within a communications system.
2. Description of Related Art
A variety of schemes have been used to provide reliable transportation of data across a network. Typically, protocols provide for guaranteed delivery of information and fragmentation of packets to send information across a network. However, these mechanisms are not typically designed for the dynamic environments of time division multiplexed power line networks which require efficient data transportation coupled low packet overhead and strong data protection. For a general background material, the reader is directed to the following United States patents, each of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety for the material contained therein: U.S. Patent Numbers and Patent Application Numbers: 2002/0174399, 2001/0037481, U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,154,780, 5,896,374, 5,815,516, 5,742,592, 5,638,384, 5,608,396, 5,497,371, 5,414,650, 5,410,546, 5,375,119, 4,941,144, 4,858,017, and 4,823,345.